I felt the "Ultimate" line actually took that too far. Driven largely, IMO, by Hollywood's interpretation of superheroes, it abandoned much of what made the original comics great. And while I'm a lifelong Marvel fan, their characters are every bit as farfetched as DC's. The only aspect about them that is truly realistic is their relatability; what they do OUT of costume. Tony Stark being a drinking, womanizing douche is real world stuff. Flying around battling evil as Iron Man is not. Peter Parker's money woes, girl issues and personal struggles are real world stuff. Swinging on webs and sticking to walls is not. The FF butting heads like most families, the X-Men being distrusted and ostracized because they were simply born different-these are the things that make Marvel characters "real". That and the fact that they live in actual real world cities, as opposed to made-up places like Gotham and Metropolis. You identify with them moreso than with an alien who grew up on a farm and never so much as scraped his knee, or a multi-billionaire who was raised by his butler. But nevertheless, once you allow for the suspension of disbelief that enables you to accept a kid getting bitten by a spider and taking on its abilities, or adamantium claws or cosmic power rings, why chicken out when it comes to things like costumes?

Well, we are arguing semantics first of all. Realism can mean a lot of different things. To some people, including me, realism relates more to character. The logic and physics of their Superheroics are secondary. Because even the Dark Knight has Batman doing things that are impossible. So if your definition of realism includes physics defying feats, the by all means, the Dark Knight should fall into that category. I personally and many others would call the Dark Knight realistic because it displays with great ingenuity the sociological impact a character like Batman would have on his world, along with the way its shot and its art direction. But it is also fantastical at the same time because an American city called Gotham doesn't exist, there are no such things as Microwave Emitters, the Bat Sonar has huge gaps in functioning logic, there are no Ninja's that dress up like they are still in the fifteenth century etc.